Monday, July 11, 2011

The Monster in your Monastery

Hello fellow Quest fans! Greetings from Palm Key. Just have time to throw up a quick blog entry I'm afraid. My day job has me taxed and timeless.

A reminder: any of the artwork, frame grabs, any graphic on this blog can be enjoyed in a larger size simply by double clicking on it. (At least on my Mac this is what happens) The art can then be dragged onto your desktop for your own collection (If your computer is lucky enough to work like my Mac does, anyway)

Osom's henchman from the yeti epsiode of Quest. This looks like the amazing design work of Alex Toth to me. Anybody know for sure?

Since the response to the Quest blog where we discovered and shared all the music cues from THE CURSE OF ANUBIS episode, and clearly so many of you, as I have, enjoy collecting and listening to the wonderful sounds Hoyt Curtin supplied for Jonny and his adventures, I decided to pick another episode and see what cues we could collect for it.

The episode where I was able to find and clean up most of its music cues, was the penultimate Quest episode MONSTER IN THE MONASTERY. This is is the episode which pitted Jonny and Hadji against a gang of political terrorists dressed as yetis to overthrow ruler Raj Guru.

I was asked last time to post the episode as well as the cues, so they could be played and compared, so first off, here is episode 25: MONSTER IN THE MONASTERY.

Download at this link, but remember, the DVD release from Warner Bros. Home Video offers infinitely better picture and sound quality:

Again there are well over twenty cues used in part and in full in this, one of the most action packed of the twenty-six episodes. I have tried to locate all of these cues in their pristine form here, but had to settle for twenty-two.

Here they are in chronological order as they appeared in the episode, but again, some are repeated throughout the twenty-five minutes. I have tried to indicate where, so you won't need to download the same cue twice.

Just click the link below each description to download the cue.

CUE 1 MAIN TITLE and MIKE ROAD VOICE OVER This is the same Main Title we posted when we did the mummy episode because it includes Mike Road's voice over on behalf of the show's sponsor.

CUE 2 THE CRY OF THE YETI As thunder and lightning rages, the villagers of small village in Nepal hear strange animal howls from the high stone walls of an ancient monastery. One town crier announces "It is the cry of the yeti" and the villagers close their doors and take their pets indoors.

Meanwhile, the high priest of the village, Raj Guru is informed that the storm has driven the yeti out of the high mountains and the people of the town are frightened. A classic piece of Quest music that showcases Hoyt Curtin's great talent for creating a pungent musical foreboding.

CUE 3 FLYING OVER THE PALACE The following morning, in the light of day, the Quests in yet another version of their jet (not the Dragonfly) talk about Raj Guru who they are planning to surprise with a visit.

The jet flies over the old palace and Benton refers to it by name -- one I can't begin to try and spell here.

CUE 4 THE FIRST YETI ATTACK The Quest's jet lands and Raj Guru explains to them that they have come at a bad time. This frame grab below of the landing is another great example of the incredible artwork Quest featured from some of the best graphic illustrators of that time.

While the Quests chat with Raj Guru, one of the snowmen attacks a villager and throws him from a cliff. This cue features Hoyt's big "monster brass", that is also used for the episode's frightening and monstrous conclusion.

CUE 5 RAINING ROCKS Up in the monastery, the yeti use catapults to bombard the village with boulders. The Quest's believe it is just an avalanche. This cue of extreme danger, is one of the Hoyt's most used cues everywhere in the Hanna-Barbera universe.

CUE 6 A RESTFUL PLACE Race and the doctor walk to the village, reflecting on how quiet the village has been in past visits. Unaware they under the watchful eye of another yeti. This Curtin cue features a piano part. This cue was often used in much less creepy scenes in other episodes.

CUE 7 YETI AT THE WINDOW As the boys dress for the festival and Jonny gets the lowdown from Hadji about yetis, Bandit catches one peeking in the window.

This cue, one of the most eerie Hoyt composed for the series, is another testament to how gifted the man was for picking a sounds and orchestrating them.

There is an instrument in this cue, a strange kind of ethereal moan, that I have no clue as to what it might be. Something along the lines of a Zither or some other instrument popular back in the 60's?

The yeti tracks seen by Jonny and Hadji when Bandit disappears chasing a yeti up the hills toward the old palace.

CUE 8 BANDIT CHASES A YETI Here is one of the classic Quest chase cues. This one is used twice in this episode. Once for Bandit chasing a yeti into the old palace and again in the third act for the boys being chased and shot at by a horde of gun wielding snow creatures.

CUE 11:GUNS FOR THE ABOMINABLE Osom opens a cabinet filled with guns and proceeds to arm his fellow yeti soldiers.

Meanwhile, Bandit and the boys watch from a balcony trying to suppress a sneeze. This familiar and danger filled cue, which escalates into a flurry of chaotic and horrific Hoyt Curtin brass, was originally used for the mummy episode where Anubis is walking.

CUE 12THE YETI ARMY ATTACKS Another Hoyt Curtin chase cue. This episode used several. A sneeze from the boys brings the yetis with guns blazing as the kids dash through the dark halls of the monastery.

Times have changed a bit since 1963, when boys could be fired at and dodge bullets as if it were simply a part of their adolesence. Today the grimmer reality of our times would probably take all the adventure out of it.

CUE 13 HIDING IN A HAY CART The boys take refuge in a cart of hay while the yeti army discusses what is to be done when they are found. Again, a repressed sneeze, this time of Bandit's -- adds to the tension and the comic relief. This another piano cue, was used more memorably in the werewolf episode of the series.

CUE 14FLAMING PROJECTILES Another classic Hoyt Curtin danger cue. Lots of wailing brass. The yeti army continues their attack on the village by firing flaming projectiles. Race, the doctor and Raj Guru see the fireballs are coming from the old palace -- and realize this is not the work of yetis.

To demonstrate how the music is used throughout a single show, I have left out the next three cues because they are cues we have already heard in this episode. FLAMING PROJECTILES cue is repeated again as the boys are targeted in the monastery.

And the danger cue called RAINING ROCKS is repeated again for Jonny making a yeti slip and slide

-- and plummet to his death.

In this Photoshop blending of several frames together you can see the layout for Osom's untimely death. This is also the shot on the censored DVD release where they removed Jonny's line: "Here comes the Oriental Express".

CUE 15BANDIT IN HIS SITES Bandit is exposed and runs from one bullet shattered pottery piece to the next in this strange sequence -- just when he runs out of places to hide, the boys save him. Only the tail of this cue is used in the episode but I post here in its entirety.

CUE 16 FIRE BOMBED ON THE ROPEWAY Raj Guru, Race and Benton are firebombed as they ride a jeep over the ropeway. Another one of those Hoyt Curtin cues that make you wonder why he wasn't scoring for the big screen.

CUE 19 RIDING THE GONG In the action finale of the episode, Jonny and Hadji cut down a giant temple gong and ride it like a flying saucer.

Only in animation could this fly -- no pun intended, but it does make a memorable escape vehicle as more bullets rip past them.

And they knock down a yeti firing at them on the way ...

Of course another of Hoyt's wonderful chase cues underscores the escape. This episode may contain more of the Quest chase cues than any that comes to memory.

At the end of this cue, as the boys get out of rifle range, a much larger, much whiter yeti creeps up to one of the firing yetis and yanks him off his feet -- setting up the unnerving payoff that is to come at the end of this one of a kind episode.

Part of the allure of Jonny Quest watching it as a kid - was his fearlessness and his ability to tough-guy talk, even at eleven or twelve, in the face of danger. No doubt Doug Wildey's influence - Jonny was cocky and fearless.

They all trek up the mountain as Hadji shows Dr. Quest one of the fake yeti skins.

CUE 21: A TERRIBLE JUSTICE This cue is also tagged the yeti takes revenge. You have heard it earlier in the episode several times scoring the snow beasts attacks. I repeat it here in order to end on that chilling note where the Quest party and Raj Guru, see all the fake yetis have been wiped out by as Benton says, "some tremendous force".

"A terrible justice has been done here," says Raj Guru, as all look high on a mountain ledge to see a real abominable snowman, an actual yeti, screaming in victory.

The last moments of it walking back into the snowy mist really gave you chills when you were a kid at the end of this, maybe the best ending of any Quest adventure.

This cue was already used twice in the episode, so you don't need to download it again if you downloaded the cue THE FIRST YETI ATTACK. I include here again under a different name for the sake of chronology.

CUE 22 END TITLE and DANCING SCREEN GEMS STICKS Those end titles (some shots borrowed from the Jack Armstrong pilot episode) and that great Hoyt Curtin music takes us out and back to regular TV for another week.

And as a blog contributor informed us in the comments section of one of the entries, this "Dancing Sticks" music was composed by Frank DeVol, a popular composer of his time. He also had an onscreen persona, using his real name, as he was the musical conductor on the series FERNWOOD TONIGHT that starred Martin Mull.

Again, I couldn't locate all the bits and pieces of score used in this episode, but there are the majority of them. Also, the names of the cues have been created by me, to better describe how they were used in the episode.

The actual Quest library of cues, were rarely named anything and were mostly identified by numers only. Though a couple of times cues got names like "Agitated Motion" or "Bad Guys" or one quiet cue that is called "Nothing's Happening..."

ON ANOTHER NOTE

Many of you have contacted me through the email address given on this blog and asked me about not just Quest music and how to get it, (which I can rarely be of help on) but also the scores from SPACE GHOST, THE MIGHTY MIGHTOR, THE HERCULOIDS -- all of the great action scores that came along after Hoyt had turned over the Hanna-Barbera music baton to musical director Ted Nichols.

I do not have any of that music (short of the SPACE GHOST Main Title that was released in the Hanna-Barbera Pik-a-nick Basket, but if anyone does know how to get that music, or can share it, you would make a lot of people who read this blog very happy.

QUEST STUFF FROM THE WEB

I will end this blog with a gathering of things sent to me and that I have found myself on the world-wide-internets that are of Quest interest. Please send me things you find or may have as well.

A very funny take on grown-up Jonny from Cartoon Network's THE VENTURE BROTHERS show. If you haven't seen this cartoon, based almost entirely on those first twenty-six Quest episodes, you are really missing out.

Some really funny Quest cartoons by this talented fellow. I have seen a couple more and if I can find them I will share them.

Someone sent me this Jonny Quest look-alike riding a camel ala THE CURSE OF ANUBIS episode. Jonny seems to have matured a bit - but seeing a live action image of this classic Quest moment does bring one to a pause.

This book came up when a search for Jonny Quest was made. Anyone have it or can tell us about it?

Fantastic piece of fan art. This person really captures the great Quest feel of the original. Anyone know who it is? Great work!

How about this magnificent rendering of Turu the Terrible from the website Deviant Art, where lots of Quest fans create fabulous Quest stuff. Would love to frame and hang this one -- great work!

How about this great take on the boys and Bandit? So much great talent out there!

More next time my friends -- would love some contributions, input anything to share with others and make this blog more of a community. I do appreciate all the requests for the Hoyt Curtin score for Quest, but again, I do not have access to that large library.

Thanks so much for posting these tracks both here and from the Anubis episode. I'm a big JQ fan from way back, and grew up with these cues, and yet typically so much of the music has been impossible to find over the decades. So this is much appreciated.

Just a heads-up, however, that cues 17 and 18 here appear to be duplicates. Thought you'd want to know.

The hardest cue I think anyone has yet to dig up is the jazzy cue used in the "House of Seven Gargoyles" as the bad guys on the sub are shooting at Race and Benton just before the Glacier falls on them, Ivar, and the stolen Ericon Bar.

After all of these years, just hearing one of Hoyt Curtin's BGMs/CUEs immediately sling-shots me back to when I was going up. Those were days I wish I could have back now. :^)

Thanks so much for all of these music cues and more importantly, for taking the time to reconstruct the OSTs for these two episodes. Getting to listen to these episodes as if they were actual soundtracks is such an awesome experience.

Hello, first I want to congratulate you, Chris, for the great site/blog! Perfect work, friend! I am very grateful for the soundtracks and visual rarities that you have shared!However, I would just warn about a cue that is missing in ''Monster In The Monastery''.First, as another user, I thought it would have been some confusion and the tracks 17 and 18 have been duplicated by mistake, but really they are repeated during the story/cartoon sequence. However, after the track 19, ''Riding The Gong'', would be correct to include a cue that you are not included. I watched this episode several times today and found out what cue was not included; it's called ''Galloping Danger'', track 41, on bootleg CD ''Incidental Themes From Jonny Quest''. Please check the episode/cartoon and compare, you will notice that in the sequence of the escape on ''Gong Flying'', there are 2 cues in fact: the first one you called “Riding The Gong” and the second one which is called ''Galloping Danger'', on CD ''Incidental Themes From Jonny Quest''. If you want more precision, please check the episode between 20:59 & 22:06, and you will notice this cue not included.Again, thank you so much for everything you have provided us, wonderful blog/site!Much peace and health, Chris!

2/11/12RobGems.ca wrote:Not only was Frank DeVol the composer of the "dancing sticks" jingle,he also was a soundtrack arranger & composer for Screen Gems/Columbia's music division for a short time in the 1960's ("The Happening" and "Guess Who's Coming to Dinner" were two compositions for Columbia's movie division),and he even acted in a handful of Screen Gems TV shows, usually as a guest star (Camp Runnamuck,I Dream Of Jeannie, Bewitched.)He didn't get to do the infamous music for the 1965 "S From Hell"logo, though; that was composed by British synthisyzer/violinist Eric Siday and Screen Gems house musician/composer Van Alexander. The late Don Kirshner became Screen Gems' musical director after selling off his Aldon Music Publishing corporation to Screen Gems in 1963, and was impressed enough with the compositions of DeVol as well as Siday and Alexander. Of course, he would later introduce the world to the bubblegum music of The Monkees and The Archies.

2/12/11RobGems.ca wrote:Still more info about Screen Gems' dancing sticks logo: It was concieved in August 1963 by Columbia Pictures' boss Abe Schnieder and his V-P son Bert Schnieder, along with Screen Gems executives John H. Mitchell, Harry Ackerman, and William Dozier. Dozier would leave Screen gems shortly after the creation of the dancing sticks, and formed his own TV company, Greenway Productions. His replacement was former child actor Jackie Cooper. The SG dancing sticks first appeared on September 15,1963 on the TV series "Redigo", "The Farmer's Daughter","Grindl", and the Harry Truman documentary series "Decisions". Retrning SG shows to have the dancing sticks included "Route 66" and :The Donna Reed Show." The dancing sticks remained on U.S. TV screens until September 1965, except in Canada, who had the dancing sticks logo until September 1966, replaced by the "S from Hell" logo. The last Canadian program believed to contain the dancing sticks was H-B's May 1966 TV special :"Alice In Wonderland...or what's a nice kid like you doing in a place like this?" American prints of this special had the "S from Hell" logo tagged on the end of the closing credits. Hal Gibney and Colin Male were the announcers of the dancing sticks logo (one announcer said the word "production", while the other announcer said the word "presentation".)

Yetis dont like imposters imperonating them and SHADOW OF THE CONDOR when Race gets saved by the Condor just imagine the story in WEEKLY WORLD NEWS the story MAN SAVED BY GIANT CONDOR FROM A WWI FANATIC and that was a ANDIAN CONDOR as well

Invisible Monster created accidentaly by Dr Norman its very simular the the Energy Monster created accidentaly by Dr Sunev on a episode of Space Ghost both would end up destroying their creator and both were eventialy stopped